<p>Just when it seemed Americans couldn’t get any gloomier about the country’s direction, they have. That finding, from the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, could leave Republicans the gloomiest of all, as prospects for their party darken further in a presidential-election year.</p>
<p>read more: [Glum</a> Mood Bodes Ill for GOP - WSJ.com](<a href=“http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120121663246015023.html]Glum”>http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120121663246015023.html)</p>
<p>“The president aside, Americans continue by double-digit margins to favor Democrats over his party to get the country out of a recession, and to handle a range of issues – the economy generally, budget deficits, health care, energy policy and homeownership problems, as well as global warming and the nation’s low standing abroad.”</p>
<p>I never thought people would think democrats are better than the republicans on the economy and budget deficits. </p>
<p>That is a flip-flop from when I was a young adult.</p>
<p>The republicans had the presidency for 19 of the last 27 years. They had control of both houses and the presidency for 6 years in a row.</p>
<p>The republicans blew it.</p>
<p>They ran out of ideas. Most of their big items have been accomplished. Welfare was cut back, government has not grown much, taxes were reduced. What’s left is too controversial. Rolling back environmental stuff won’t happen until we get more desperate for resources. Immigration–nobody agrees.</p>
<p>“Most of their big items have been accomplished.”</p>
<p>Explosive deficit growth was one of their big items?</p>
<p>We had a major recession thanks to the Dotcom and market busts which happened under Bill Clinton. Typically we run deficits during recessions. Obviously the Iraq War kept that higher than it would have been otherwise. Without Iraq we were getting close to 0 deficit. I’m not that worried about moderate deficits so long as they stay within a small % of GDP. Inflation and interest rates were very attractive so the deficits did not scare the $$$ people all that much.</p>
<p>FF on Iraq WMD’s, meet Barrons on national debt. </p>
<p>Barrons, the reality is that the national debt is currently at a fifty-year high as a percentage of the GDP. It went from 31% of the GDP at the start of Reagan’s first term to 69% this year, and growing. The only administrations under which the debt grew as a percent of GDP since WWII were Reagan, Bush and Bush. The debt declined during Clinton’s administration, starting long before the dot-com boom. There was and is absolutely no chance that the annual deficit would reduce to zero under Bush’s “plan.” “Getting close to 0 deficit” - what have you been smoking lately? :)</p>
<p>Facts. Inconvenient, but unavoidable. Your efforts to reinvent the past so as to put your favored politicians in a rosy light come crashing into the harsh reality of the obvious and unavoidable failure of their policies. Reagan, Bush and Bush screwed America financially, plain and simple, for now and for generations to come.</p>
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<p>Are you kidding? Patriot Act, Homeland Security, etc etc… Now I’m a republican and I despise the democrats, but I am very much in favor of small government and getting rid of such idiocy as the Patriot Act.</p>
<p>Besides, we wouldn’t have had the dotcoms if Al Gore hadn’t invented the Internets. ;)</p>
<p>TIME cover story is same.</p>
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<p>Over 60 percent is small???</p>
<p><a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_by_U.S._presidential_terms[/url]”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_by_U.S._presidential_terms</a></p>
<p>When it comes to debts and irresponsible spending Republicans have failed.</p>
<p>And what is this “without Iraq.” If you want to go to war, pay for it. The 2003 tax cuts during a time of massive war spending is so hypocritical. I am still waiting for the sheets crowd of ff, sharp, barrons to explain the debts.</p>
<p>Well, gottaloveucla, I think that Barrons is referring to the annual deficit, which is simply the amount we add to the national debt each year. And the deficit is “only” about 3% of the GDP. Of course, if we didn’t have to pay interest on the accumulated national debt, we would be running a surplus (which would be a nice thing, considering what we’ll be facing vis a vis social security and medicare in a few years.) But we’re not. We’re still paying interest on the money Reagan and BushI borrowed for no better reason than to be able to lower taxes for people who already had more money than they could spend in a lifetime - their “base”, as BushII referred to them - with the result that we go a little deeper in debt every year, leaving the mess for our children to clean up. The problem Barrons is ignoring is if you keep running a “small” deficit each year, eventually your debt gets so large that your annual income is consumed just by paying debt service.</p>
<p>Barrons is just repeating a bit of disinformation that’s been circulated through the right wing for several years now. Like most right wing propaganda, it has superficial appeal. It’s actual lack of validity doesn’t come out until you drag it out and expose it to the light of day.</p>
<p>That is the total accum amount, not the annual. If you make $150,000 and borrow $400,000 for a house you owe 2.7 times your GDP. Will you lose sleep over that? (Assuming values get stable again) Not so long as your payment is just 18% of your income. Our annual debt payment is just a small percent of GDP.
Total Iraq and related spending for the year us supposed to be around $200B. The total deficit before the recent downturn was projected at around $250 B so if you subtract out the money going to Iraq the net amount is only $50 B. That is much closer to 0 that recent past years.</p>
<p>“It went from 31% of the GDP at the start of Reagan’s first term to 69% this year, and growing. The only administrations under which the debt grew as a percent of GDP since WWII were Reagan, Bush and Bush. The debt declined during Clinton’s administration, starting long before the dot-com boom.”</p>
<p>Debts as % of GDP:
1993 - 66.2%
1994 - 66.7%
1995 - 67.2%
1996 - 67.3%
1997 - 65.6%
1998 - 63.5%
1999 - 61.4%
2000 - 58.0%
2001 - 57.4%
2002 - 59.7%
2003 - 62.5%
2004 - 63.9%
2005 - 64.4%
2006 - 64.7% last year official numbers are available</p>
<p><a href=“http://zfacts.com/metaPage/lib/OMB-Historical-Table-7-1.pdf[/url]”>http://zfacts.com/metaPage/lib/OMB-Historical-Table-7-1.pdf</a></p>
<p>Kluge, you have already indicated that you are not really into precision, but for those of us who are, let’s look at your statements relative to facts:</p>
<p>“It went from 31% of the GDP at the start of Reagan’s first term to 69% this year”</p>
<p>False (latest data shows 64.7%) unless you have data that is not included in the Fiscal 2008 budget data</p>
<p>“the national debt is currently at a fifty-year high as a percentage of the GDP.”</p>
<p>False - the latest recorded data is 64.7% which is lower than 93, 94, 95, 96 and 97</p>
<p>“The debt declined during Clinton’s administration, starting long before the dot-com boom.” </p>
<p>Sorta true - it did decline if you look at it from beginning to end, but to say that it was “long before the dot-com boom” is a stretch. It was fairly stable at a rate higher than the latest rate for five years. It did not get to be lower than the most recent rate until 1998 which corresponds to the approximate beginning of the dot-com boom.</p>
<p>Facts. Inconvenient, but unavoidable.</p>
<p>Here’s the book on budgets, interest and all going forward. Just not that scary.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/89xx/doc8917/01-23-2008_BudgetOutlook.pdf[/url]”>http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/89xx/doc8917/01-23-2008_BudgetOutlook.pdf</a></p>
<p>All the money ends up in China, anyway. And they will own the big banks. So what’s the big deal? Let 'em default.</p>
<p>The scary part is after 2018. But why should we care?</p>
<p>There are facts and there are facts.</p>
<p>Clinton inherited a debt to gdp ratio of 66%</p>
<p>When he left it was around 58%.</p>
<p>Bush ran it up to 64% so far.</p>
<p>From World War 2 to Reagan, the ratio was on a downward path. Then the fiscally prudent republicans too over.</p>
<p>So the facts are under republican presidents after 1980, the debt to gdp ratio went up.</p>
<p>Under the one democrat president after 1980, it went down.</p>
<p>The latest recorded debt ratio is not an all time high if that gives you solace.</p>
<p>But its close. :)</p>
<p>If I was a republican, I wouldn’t have provided the link.</p>
<p>But thanks.</p>
<p>Debt as % of gdp</p>
<p>1981 … 32.6
1982 … 35.2
1983 … 39.9
1984 … 40.7
1985 … 43.9
1986 … 48.1
1987 …50.5
1988 … 51.9
1989 … 53.1
1990 … 55.9
1991 … 60.6
1992 … 64.1</p>
<p>If we default, we can give 'em New Jersey.</p>
<p>Yes, it’s gone up but what is the exact connection to any economic problems. It did not create the wealth concentration which seems to be peeve #1 these days or the stagnant middleclass. It certainly did not create the housing boom and downturn. Are we short on capital–not really–mostly we are swimming in it. It sounds bad but where is the bad stuff? Inflation, modest --more tied to oil prices than anything else.</p>
<p>“Inflation, modest --more tied to oil prices than anything else”</p>
<p>Barrons, I know you know that inflation is a monetary problem. </p>
<p>The real bad stuff occurs later because there comes a point when we can’t service the debt. When the baby boomers retire and social security and medicare expenses explode and debt service payments increase at the same time…I’m sure you’ve seen the reports on what is going to happen.</p>
<p>Some of us are forward looking.</p>
<p>Here is another way all the debt and deficits make an impact.</p>
<p>In the early to mid 1980’s, we made a choice. We lowered income tax rates. Most of the money went from the government to the richest people. We raised social security rates. Most of the money went from the lower and middle class to the government. Do you see what was happening here? The government was just the middle man. The money went from the lower and middle class to the richest people.</p>
<p>Then. we not only took that social security money and spent it all, we borrowed extra and gave it to the more wealthy people. </p>
<p>Now, after we spent all that social security money plus more, social security needs that money back. What are we going to do. We already spent the lower and middle income people’s money. Now we tell them, I’m sorry. We don’t have the social security money. We spent it on other things (income tax rate cuts mostly to the richest people). So we need to raise your taxes (social security taxes, and you even said today you want to do this). We also have to cut your benefits because we spent the money.</p>
<p>The lower and middle class got screwed.</p>
<p>It’s simple arithmetic, Barrons. Any explanation that argues otherwise is bs.</p>
<p>Because it is simple arithmetic. It’s not calculus. It’s not even algebra.</p>
<p>And you wonder why the middle and lower class are mad?</p>
<p>Come on Barrons. </p>
<p>I expect better from you.</p>
<p>Some of the other people, I don’t.</p>